{"id":147682,"date":"2021-07-27T13:01:35","date_gmt":"2021-07-27T02:01:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/?p=147682"},"modified":"2021-08-02T12:17:47","modified_gmt":"2021-08-02T01:17:47","slug":"review-she-who-became-the-sun-by-shelley-parker-chan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/2021\/07\/27\/review-she-who-became-the-sun-by-shelley-parker-chan\/","title":{"rendered":"REVIEW: She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"She<\/a>
Review by Isabella Noyes, CRM Assistant.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

If you loved The Song of Achilles<\/em>, you won\u2019t be disappointed in this sweeping tale! She Who Became The Sun<\/a><\/em><\/strong> is a potent, queer re-imagining of the beginnings of China\u2019s Ming Dynasty. Shelley Parker-Chan\u2019s novel is loosely based on the events of The Red Turban Rebellion and Zhu Yuanzhang\u2019s rise to power.<\/p>\n\n\n

\"Shelley<\/a>

Shelley Parker-Chan<\/p><\/div>\n

You\u2019d expect nothing less from Parker-Chan, whose addiction to epic East Asian historical TV dramas is evident in this ruthless saga about glory and self-preservation. Parker-Chan\u2019s writing is exquisite in its description of setting and her seamless transitions through time. Her voice blends and shifts effortlessly with the band of characters\u2019 perspectives, bringing them to life with profound depth.<\/p>\n\n\n

This story follows an unnamed female narrator on her quest for greatness. As a child, a local fortune teller predicts that her life will amount to nothing while her older brother is promised \u2018greatness\u2019. After the death of her family, our heroine absorbs her brother\u2019s gender, identity and destiny. Known by her brother\u2019s name for the duration of the novel, Zhu meets an assortment of interesting and complex characters including Ouyang, a eunuch general who has long bided his time for revenge and Ma, a beautiful general\u2019s daughter whose empathy catches a certain protagonist\u2019s eye.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What I loved were the strong parallels between She Who Became The Su<\/em>n and the rich historical truth woven throughout the book. As much as I don\u2019t want to admit it, I could almost<\/em> hear Disney\u2019s \u2018I\u2019ll Make A Man Out Of You\u2019 from Mulan <\/em>whenever I noticed the similarities in the beginning of Zhu\u2019s story. However, the comparisons end early because Zhu is no Disney princess; she is cunning, cold-blooded and unpredictable. This is not a light-hearted story about belonging and dragons voiced by Eddie Murphy. It\u2019s a bleak, yet promising historical fantasy about female resilience in a man\u2019s world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2014She Who Became the Sun<\/a><\/em> by Shelley Parker-Chan (Pan Macmillan Australia) is out now.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

‘A potent, queer re-imagining of the beginnings of China\u2019s Ming Dynasty.’<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":147689,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[6678],"tags":[6799,1974,4131,4484,13365,13364,4963],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/SheWhoBecameTheSun-Social.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147682"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147682"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147682\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":148142,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147682\/revisions\/148142"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booktopia.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}